Debbie Sparks Update

I called the doctor's office about the ultrasound mishap. I was surprised that they weren't more concerned about it! They basically said, "yeah, that happens sometimes". They had me check the end of the DVD to see if my ultrasound got tacked on at the end of Debbie's. Turns out that's exactly what happened so we still have our ultrasound and all is well.

I HEART Cook's Illustrated

If you know me very well you know that I LOVE cookbooks. Seriously, I like to read them cover to cover like a novel. I even checked one out from the library in 1st grade. Anyhow, I got a new one yesterday. "The Best Make-Ahead Recipe" is published by the people who put out Cook's Illustrated and it is fantastic. I'm getting together with some friends next month to do a freezer cooking session at one of their houses.

Who is Debbie Sparks?

I met Trish for coffee today and had her bring her laptop so I could finally show her the DVD of the ultrasound we had in September. The first frame surprised me a little because it showed a baby with its arms and legs in the air. I could have sworn our baby was curled up in a ball on its tummy but I chalked it up to my faulty memory. A few minutes later I noticed the name "Debbie Sparks" in the upper left hand corner (where the patient's name is) and broke the news to Trish...this was not my baby.

I'm disappointed and I really hope my doctor's office has a backup of MY ultrasound. I'm calling first thing Monday morning so I will let you know what happens.

FYI

Things are really shaping up in Boise...

This week I signed us up for our childbirth class. It starts on November 19 and goes four weeks.

Tomorrow morning we're going to the hospital for a tour. It starts at 9:30 and goes for TWO HOURS. I'm excited to see what the labor and delivery area look like but I can't imagine why the tour takes two hours! I think we will have a chance to pre-register at the end of the tour so that will be another thing to cross off my massive to do list.

Good News about Thanksgiving

Adam and I decided not to travel for Thanksgiving or Christmas this year for a number of reasons. Well actually, we decided not to travel for Thanksgiving but the timing of the baby makes it so we cannot travel for Christmas. Anyhow, with Adam starting a new job and me being pretty tired, it just didn't make sense to travel for Thanksgiving.

I was starting to worry because I happen to know we don't particularly love holidays when it's just the two of us. I thought we would end up

A. cooking a big dinner for just the two of us
B. going to Cracker Barrel for Thanksgiving...again

OR

C. subtly begging Trish to include us in her festivities

Lucky for everyone (and especially Trish), Sue (Adam's grandmother) decided to come out to Boise for Thanksgiving. We are really excited to see her because she's never seen our condo and she's always fun to spend time with.

The Name Game

We think we've decided on both first AND middle names. It's practically a miracle! Of course we may change our minds on the middle names so don't go embroidering things...

Weekend Update 3

Adam and I had a very productive weekend! On Saturday, we put up the rain gutter book shelf, took care of leaves in our yard, ran errands, watched football and went to a party. I'm always really tired on Saturday so I also took a nice long nap.

Sunday was even more productive. We made a trip to the grocery store and did a bunch of laundry. Adam had a friend over and I made 2.5 meals! I made meatloaf for Sunday's dinner, curry chicken for tonight (it's always better the next day) and prepped the ingredients for a crock pot roast I'm making on Tuesday. I froze enough meatloaf for it to be dinner another night. I'm trying to freeze 1-2 meals a week until the baby is born...some weeks I am more successful than others. I also finished reading a book and tried to watch Pippi Longstocking with Adam.

In the Gutter

Thanks to my dear friend Trish we found a cool way to display books without spending $95 on the Pottery Barn shelf I wrote about last week! Trish suggested using rain gutters as book shelves. I was skeptical but she swore it would look cute. I did some research and realized these might actually come out looking pretty cool.

Today we went to Home Depot to get the necessary supplies. We had a few problems but we got the shelf up and we think it looks pretty cool.

What do you think?

I'll Sleep When I'm Dead

I have never had trouble sleeping. My college roommate got in trouble with our RA (for being too NOISY!) while I was sleeping. I've slept pretty peacefully on the floor at an airport. I never used to wake up much in the night.

Ever since I've been pregnant though I wake up about 100 times a night to pee. In the last week I've begun to enjoy a new (and much more annoying) problem...I can't sleep in any one position for longer than 30 minutes. I am constantly tossing and turning to find a comfortable position (but there doesn't seem to be one). As if that wasn't bad enough, I am also a really light sleeper now.

I guess this is how the body gets ready for sleep deprivation and waking up when the baby cries but that doesn't really console me. I just really want to sleep comfortably ONE NIGHT!

Signs of Life

Adam finally got to feel the baby move!!! It was faint but it was definitely the baby!

It's funny too because for the past week or two the baby stopped moving as soon as I called Adam over to feel it. I told him he had to be patient and keep his hand there for more than a few seconds. His reply..."Oh, so it's like fishing."

Weekend Update 2

We didn't get much done this weekend in the baby's room. I went to bed early on Friday night (really early, it might not have been dark yet) and felt pretty tired all day Saturday. We did manage to rake up some leaves and listen to the Duck game online. Adam went grocery shopping and I spent a lot of time resting.

Sunday was more productive. We got up early, took Mick for a walk, cleaned the house, saw a movie, did a bunch of laundry and made our famous pizza for dinner.

We really don't have much left to do in the baby's room. Here's our list...

1. put up curtains (we can't find the hardware right now)
   
2. order and assemble the crib
   
3. consolidate or move our computer stuff so that we have a little more room for baby stuff
4. have new doors installed
5. install shelving for books

We need some help with the book shelving. I would like to copy this idea I saw in Pottery Barn Kids but I don't want to pay $95 for each unit! It seems like it wouldn't be too hard to find or make something similar.

Does anyone have an idea of how we could duplicate this? We would be okay with something of different dimensions, we just like the idea of books being displayed and so readily available.

My Favorite Things

I just got this mug as a gift from my friend Trish. We had coffee (decaf for me) on Thursday after I helped run interference during a birthday shopping trip for her oldest daughter. She also got us baby's first stuffed animal. Adam loves the "snugglepup" and even Mick is pretty interested in it.

I Thought I Had More Time

Today marks 98 days until our due date! When we first found out we would be having a baby January seemed so far away. Now it's starting to sneak up on me. The baby will come whether we're ready or not but I would like to be ready!

A Dubious Milestone

I noticed this morning that when I am lying flat on my back I can see my own belly.

I know this will bring up the question, "why haven't you posted any pictures?" It has nothing to do with vanity or not having a camera or any other of the myriad of excuses one could come up with at a time like this. It's on our list but we just keep forgetting. We will get on the ball and I promise pictures before the end of the week.

Weekend Update

Last weekend we put up a tension rod and curtain over the baby's closet. We decided against doors for now because we like the cottage feel of the curtain look. I didn't intend for this to happen but the nursery is starting to take on a Shabby Chic look.

We worked more on cleaning out the nursery this weekend. We got my treasured angel print on the wall (I had it in my room as a child...my mother had it in her room as a child...my baby MUST have it). It has a pink frame and we picked it up at a church rummage sale for $5 a few years ago.

I decided to check out The Painted Chair (a really cool/funky furniture place in Boise) to see if I could find a dresser that might double as a changing table. I found one I liked and it was only $89! It's black and fits in with the decor of the room and the price was right. I drove home to drag Adam back so we could buy it and lug it home.

Now, you may remember that Adam and I have two cars but they are cars (not trucks, vans, SUVs...). Because of this we often struggle with how to get things home. We've managed to get some huge things home though (like a buffet) so we thought this tiny little dresser would be NO PROBLEM. Turns out the thing is barely inches too large to fit into my car. We tried every Tetris move we could think of and we just couldn't get the stupid thing in the Accord. We do have a really nice neighbor with a truck though and she is going to take me to pick up the dresser Monday afternoon.

Today we are going to put up some other items from The Painted Chair. I bought them over a year ago with a baby room in mind...a blue shadow box shelf thing and a clothespin memo board. The Painted Chair also had a really cool black rocking chair for $99. We already have a chair in the room but I really want a rocking chair because I don't think the chair we have will be good for nursing. If they still have it on Monday I will probably buy it.

We still need to get a crib (we found a great black crib from Babies R Us that we want) but the room is shaping up. Now we need to figure out what to do with our computer and desk setup. We want to get a laptop but the reality is that the baby's room will probably double as our office for a while.

Clownin' Around 2

So if you've been reading this blog faithfully you know that Adam got a chance to be a Ringling Bros. clown on Thursday and write about the experience. Unfortunately the article isn't online but Adam was kind enough to retype it for your reading pleasure. Also available online are the pictures.

Clown for a day
IPT reporter spends time learning performance tricks at the circus

By Adam Ross

"You're not a guy any more. You're a clown. You're a magical being
with special powers -- which is to make people laugh."

NAMPA -- Those words, spoken to me only half an hour earlier by clown
Tom Dougherty, seemed distant after a span of two minutes where I
nearly fell on a child tripping over my clown shoes and had a parent
tell me his daughter "doesn't really like clowns."

How long does it take for those powers to kick in? Looking for my
clown superiors proved little help, as all three were commanding their
own audiences, effortlessly holding the gazes of young and old.

With about 15 minutes -- and probably double that number in autographs
-- remaining until the makeup came off, the time was now to strive for
my clowning achievement. Looking for any circus-goer who would give my
act a chance I suddenly realize that I still don't have an act (or a
functioning joke).

The offer didn't sound this challenging: Be a guest clown at the
Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Then again, these aren't
the kind of clowns who do birthday parties and blow up a balloon.

In the 'alley'

Before I was set loose in the circus' pre-show at the Idaho Center on
Thursday, I was the subject of a Frankenstein-like project in the
clown "alley" (dressing room). My facial featues would dictate the
clown makeup, and my silly get-up was born out of the wardrobe from
two clowns with over 50 years combined experience in the business.
Dougherty was a constant source of clown philosophy and history,
relating his experience as an instructor at the circus' official clown
college and decades of practice in the art.

A contrast to Dougherty's wild caricature of sophisticate was Mitch
Freddes, a rare breed of clown who does not use speech or mime
elements in his act. Freddes' makeup, costume and body language is
able to convey the qualities of a lovable, bumbling character.
Dougherty estimates there are probably three other clowns in the
United States with an act similar to Freddes'.

Both clowns started with Ringling Bros. int he late 1970s, when each
of the company's two circus lines had 28 clowns. Now the two larger
lines (blue and red) have 12 clowns, and the gold line that visits
Nampa and other smaller markets only has three.

"The American circus clown is starting to die out, " Dougherty said candidly.
Dougherty and Freddes give me a crash course in the art of clowning,
frequently tossing in snapshots from their careers, both of which
included extended stints away from Ringling Bros. While trying to
explain a gag I can do at the pre-show, Dougherty recalls a joke from
1984 that still makes him laugh.

"I had a big eyeball coming out of my back on a little wire, aiming at
me, and I was reading George Orwell's '1984' -- the few people who got
the joke burst out laughing," Dougherty said, referring to the Big
Brother aspect of the classic novel. "It was probably 1 in 10. A
delicious little moment."

But a clown's job is not immune to traumatic moments. At any time,
Dougherty and Freddes might hear "The 12th Street Rag" from the circus
band -- code for trouble that signals the clowns to distract the
audience. The two clowns recalled a time years ago when that song
summoned them to perform while staff tended an aerial artist's fall.
The resulting 10 minutes of entertaining seemed like the longest of
their career.

Under the big top

With my moment in the spotlight fast approaching, Dougherty and
Freddes built up my confidence like a pair of trainers for a nervous
boxer.

"The circus is a poetic expression of spirit," Dougherty told me.
"What drove us to land on the moon is the same spirit that drives the
guy to land the triple somersault. We're expanding the boundaries of
experience, and the audience lives vicariously through us."

I pace through the game plan one more time: I walk out with the
performers and entertain small groups with my Prince Charming gag, a
shoe on a pillow that may find me a queen. aFter a few minutes of
that, I help Dougherty with his seat gag, where we go into the
audience and toil over the problems presented by the flip-up Idaho
Center seats. It soudned promising walking through the routine before
the audience streamed in, but it's also easy to run into the end zone
on an empty football field.

The optimistic thoughts escaped me when confronted with a sea of
circus-goers who expected to be entertained by the clown in front of
them. Suddenly I was at a loss, and my Prince charming gag wasn't
saving me.

Luckily, I soon found that posing for pictures was enough to satisfy
most and served as an easy-enough mask for my clown inexperience. The
seat routine with Dougherty went off better than expected, and once
behind the curtain my seemingly modest efforts earned praise.
With the big show about to start and my makeup about to come off,
Dougherty shared what matters most to him during these 50-city,
two-year tours. Decades of clowning has made him a fixture in family
photo albums around the country, with some fans even having him sign
pictures taken with the clown years earlier.

In a brief revelation, I imagine the family pictures I posed for that
night, and how my inexperience won't show up on film. They'll only see
a clown.
"Clown is all about connection," Dougherty told me before the show.
"It's what we do, we connect to people."

A Visit to the Doc

I went to see my OB yesterday for a regular check-up. I got a flu shot which wasn't bad at all. I lost two pounds in the last month (probably a result of the pain in my neck since I hardly ate anything for a week) but everything else was perfect. My blood pressure was good and the baby's heartbeat was 138. I go in again the first week in November and get to drink the dreaded orange elixir for my gestational diabetes screening.

My doctor is sending me to a spinal specialist so I can get an MRI to make sure I don't actually have something wrong with my neck. Also, we pretty much decided that Tylenol doesn't work for my body. That stinks because Tylenol is the ONLY thing you can really take when you are pregnant.

For Those About to Talk

Adam and I saw a version of this shirt on vacation this summer. I should have bought it! I've been looking online for one to buy for Adam's Christmas stocking. I think I will buy this one from Pixie Rock

Clownin' Around

So yeah, this post isn't really baby related. Whatever.

Adam got to be in the circus last night!!!!!! Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey came to town and offered Adam (fun-loving reporter that he is) the opportunity to be dressed up as a clown and perform with them in the "pre-show". I went to the circus for the first time in 10 years and was amazed at the quality of the show. Adam had fun and got a souvenir stuffed elephant. The best souvenir of all though...

It's a Girl!!!!!

Or at least that's what one of my students thinks. I told my first grade reading group that I have a baby in my tummy (it was all part of a discussion about keeping people safe from germs) and one of the girls said, "You're having a baby? It's a girl!"

So if you're willing to take the word of a 6-year-old with no previous record as a seer, you should start thinking pink.